Tuesday, March 5, 2013

A Less Expensive Alternative To Kong: Yum-It-Up! Chicken Flavor Spread For Dogs!



The Good: Myah loves it, Easy to use, Appears nutritious for dogs, Less expensive than competitors
The Bad: Not wild about aerosols/environmental impact of the packaging.
The Basics: A wonderful flavor, Myah enjoys Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread as a less expensive alternative to Kong Stuff’N.


We love our dog, Myah. In fact, we work very hard to keep from making too many comparisons between her and her dearly departed sister (in spirit!), Mitzie. We tried to give Myah as much of a fresh start as possible. In fact, the only hand-me-down I can recall between our two beloved canine family members was Mitzie’s Kong Dog Toy (reviewed here!), which is now Myah’s. Since moving to Michigan with Myah and my wife, I have found that I fill the Kong toy with non-Kong products more often than not. Chief among those products is the Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread for dogs. Myah, who has had both Kong brand Stuff’N, shows no difference in enthusiasm between the products, which makes it very easy to recommend the Yum-It-Up! Spread, at least the Chicken flavor!

The regular 8 oz. container of Yum-It-Up! Spread lasted only a few weeks and after that, Myah brought her toy out and began eagerly looking at me, as if I could magically refill it.

Yum-It-Up! Spread is best analogized as spray cheese for dog, save that it is meat flavored. The principle holds, though; this is an 8 oz. aerosol can filled with a paste that is sprayed out a nozzle either into the toy or onto poor Myah's nose (my wife finds this hilarious and Myah's tongue goes wild cleaning herself up) or another surface one is fine with having a dog lick up. The dog consumes the Yum-It-Up! Spread and seems all the happier for it. In the toy, Yum-It-Up! Spread becomes a dexterity challenge for the dog with the Yum-It-Up! Spread as a reward that they enjoy for figuring out exactly where in the toy it is and being able to manipulate it enough to lick it out.

Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread is easily distinguishable from the other flavors of Yum-It-Up! Spread by the yellow cap and the bright orange label denoting the Chicken flavor on the can. Like other Yum-It-Up! Spread products, Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread is presented in a dispenser that is, including the cap, shaped just like a spray cheese can. The 8 oz. spray can has a cap which is easy to flick off as it has a tab that can allow access with only a thumb. Removing the cap reveals the nozzle which is also shaped like a spray cheese nozzle. It is a one inch long piece of plastic which is essentially a tube with little tines at the end. Pressing the nozzle starts the Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread spraying out of the can.

Perhaps the most obvious way to use Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread is in the Kong dog toy, which is where it is intended to be used (or a similar style toy). The Kong toy has two holes, one of which is the exact size as the nozzle. Pressing the nozzle into the small hole and shifting it causes the Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread to fill the toy. Yum-It-Up! Spread expands (not quite as extremely as other aerosol-compressed products like shaving gel) slightly and if one uses the recommended one to three teaspoons of Yum-It-Up! Spread as it comes out of the can, it ought to expand over a few seconds to be about a two and a half teaspoons of Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread. Strangely, the idea of one teaspoon being a serving is nullified some by the toy itself; a single teaspoon is tiny in the cavity in the toy. We tend to spoil Myah and instead fill her Medium Toy up about a third full (by the time we give it to her, it is about half full).

As for the taste, Myah consistently leapt upon the Yum-It-Up! Spread. Every time we picked up the can, she came running and she was very diligent in getting the paste out of her toy. The paste is light brown and comes out of the can about the consistency of toothpaste.

The product is not kept refrigerated and still it lasts for years (ours does not expire until October 2014, but it did not last anywhere near that long).

For those worried about the nutrition of this treat, Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread has at least 6% crude protein and 17% crude fat. The Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread has no more than 1% crude fiber and 53% moisture. Given that it is primarily made of water, cheese, and soybean oil, there is a lot of stuff in the Yum-It-Up! Spread that is good for dogs.

The way Myah goes for Chicken Yum-It-Up! Spread over any other paste-food options indicates to me that this is a real winner with dogs! Despite how inexpensive it is, I always find myself wishing there was more in the can and I know Myah wishes the same!

For other dog treat reviews, please check out:
Hartz Chew 'N Clean Bacon Flavor Durable Chew Toy
RedBarn Ham & Cheese Flavor Filled Rawhide Bone
Bacon & Cheese Flavor Beggin' Strips

8/10

For other pet product reviews, please click here to visit my index page!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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